Matthew 5:24–26

¹⁶Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.

¹⁷Recompense to no man evil for evil. Provide things honest in the sight of all men.

¹⁸If it be possible, as much as lieth in you, live peaceably with all men.

¹⁵¶ Moreover if thy brother shall trespass against thee, go and tell him his fault between thee and him alone: if he shall hear thee, thou hast gained thy brother.

¹⁶But if he will not hear thee, then take with thee one or two more, that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established.

¹⁷And if he shall neglect to hear them, tell it unto the church: but if he neglect to hear the church, let him be unto thee as an heathen man and a publican.

⁷Likewise, ye husbands, dwell with them according to knowledge, giving honour unto the wife, as unto the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life; that your prayers be not hindered.

⁸Finally, be ye all of one mind, having compassion one of another, love as brethren, be pitiful, be courteous:

⁸Therefore take unto you now seven bullocks and seven rams, and go to my servant Job, and offer up for yourselves a burnt offering; and my servant Job shall pray for you: for him will I accept: lest I deal with you after your folly, in that ye have not spoken of me the thing which is right, like my servant Job.

⁹Debate thy cause with thy neighbour himself; and discover not a secret to another:

⁷Now therefore there is utterly a fault among you, because ye go to law one with another. Why do ye not rather take wrong? why do ye not rather suffer yourselves to be defrauded?

⁸Nay, ye do wrong, and defraud, and that your brethren.

⁸I will therefore that men pray every where, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and doubting.

²⁸But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that bread, and drink of that cup.

¹³Who is a wise man and endued with knowledge among you? let him shew out of a good conversation his works with meekness of wisdom.

¹⁴But if ye have bitter envying and strife in your hearts, glory not, and lie not against the truth.

¹⁵This wisdom descendeth not from above, but is earthly, sensual, devilish.

¹⁶For where envying and strife is, there is confusion and every evil work.

¹⁷But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, and easy to be intreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality, and without hypocrisy.

¹⁸And the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace of them that make peace.

²³Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and faith: these ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone.

⁵⁰Salt is good: but if the salt have lost his saltness, wherewith will ye season it? Have salt in yourselves, and have peace one with another.

⁵⁸¶ When thou goest with thine adversary to the magistrate, as thou art in the way, give diligence that thou mayest be delivered from him; lest he hale thee to the judge, and the judge deliver thee to the officer, and the officer cast thee into prison.

⁵⁹I tell thee, thou shalt not depart thence, till thou hast paid the very last mite.

⁸Go not forth hastily to strive, lest thou know not what to do in the end thereof, when thy neighbour hath put thee to shame.

¹³But exhort one another daily, while it is called To day; lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.

⁶¶ Seek ye the Lord while he may be found, call ye upon him while he is near:

⁷Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.

³¹Or what king, going to make war against another king, sitteth not down first, and consulteth whether he be able with ten thousand to meet him that cometh against him with twenty thousand?

³²Or else, while the other is yet a great way off, he sendeth an ambassage, and desireth conditions of peace.

⁷Wherefore (as the Holy Ghost saith, To day if ye will hear his voice,

²⁴¶ Strive to enter in at the strait gate: for many, I say unto you, will seek to enter in, and shall not be able.

²⁵When once the master of the house is risen up, and hath shut to the door, and ye begin to stand without, and to knock at the door, saying, Lord, Lord, open unto us; and he shall answer and say unto you, I know you not whence ye are:

²⁶And the king of Israel said, Take Micaiah, and carry him back unto Amon the governor of the city, and to Joash the king’s son;

²⁷And say, Thus saith the king, Put this fellow in the prison, and feed him with bread of affliction and with water of affliction, until I come in peace.

¹⁷For ye know how that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was rejected: for he found no place of repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears.

²¹Acquaint now thyself with him, and be at peace: thereby good shall come unto thee.

¹MY son, if thou be surety for thy friend, if thou hast stricken thy hand with a stranger,

²Thou art snared with the words of thy mouth, thou art taken with the words of thy mouth.

³Do this now, my son, and deliver thyself, when thou art come into the hand of thy friend; go, humble thyself, and make sure thy friend.

⁴Give not sleep to thine eyes, nor slumber to thine eyelids.

⁵Deliver thyself as a roe from the hand of the hunter, and as a bird from the hand of the fowler.

²(For he saith, I have heard thee in a time accepted, and in the day of salvation have I succoured thee: behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation.)

³And Jacob sent messengers before him to Esau his brother unto the land of Seir, the country of Edom.

⁴And he commanded them, saying, Thus shall ye speak unto my lord Esau; Thy servant Jacob saith thus, I have sojourned with Laban, and stayed there until now:

⁵And I have oxen, and asses, flocks, and menservants, and womenservants: and I have sent to tell my lord, that I may find grace in thy sight.

⁶¶ And the messengers returned to Jacob, saying, We came to thy brother Esau, and also he cometh to meet thee, and four hundred men with him.

⁷Then Jacob was greatly afraid and distressed: and he divided the people that was with him, and the flocks, and herds, and the camels, into two bands;

⁸And said, If Esau come to the one company, and smite it, then the other company which is left shall escape.

³And he passed over before them, and bowed himself to the ground seven times, until he came near to his brother.

⁴And Esau ran to meet him, and embraced him, and fell on his neck, and kissed him: and they wept.

⁵And he lifted up his eyes, and saw the women and the children; and said, Who are those with thee? And he said, The children which God hath graciously given thy servant.

⁶Then the handmaidens came near, they and their children, and they bowed themselves.

⁷And Leah also with her children came near, and bowed themselves: and after came Joseph near and Rachel, and they bowed themselves.

⁸And he said, What meanest thou by all this drove which I met? And he said, These are to find grace in the sight of my lord.

⁹And Esau said, I have enough, my brother; keep that thou hast unto thyself.

¹⁰And Jacob said, Nay, I pray thee, if now I have found grace in thy sight, then receive my present at my hand: for therefore I have seen thy face, as though I had seen the face of God, and thou wast pleased with me.

¹¹Take, I pray thee, my blessing that is brought to thee; because God hath dealt graciously with me, and because I have enough. And he urged him, and he took it.

⁶For this shall every one that is godly pray unto thee in a time when thou mayest be found: surely in the floods of great waters they shall not come nigh unto him.

¹⁷Now therefore know and consider what thou wilt do; for evil is determined against our master, and against all his household: for he is such a son of Belial, that a man cannot speak to him.

¹⁸¶ Then Abigail made haste, and took two hundred loaves, and two bottles of wine, and five sheep ready dressed, and five measures of parched corn, and an hundred clusters of raisins, and two hundred cakes of figs, and laid them on asses.

¹⁹And she said unto her servants, Go on before me; behold, I come after you. But she told not her husband Nabal.

²⁰And it was so, as she rode on the ass, that she came down by the covert of the hill, and, behold, David and his men came down against her; and she met them.

²¹Now David had said, Surely in vain have I kept all that this fellow hath in the wilderness, so that nothing was missed of all that pertained unto him: and he hath requited me evil for good.

²²So and more also do God unto the enemies of David, if I leave of all that pertain to him by the morning light any that pisseth against the wall.

²³And when Abigail saw David, she hasted, and lighted off the ass, and fell before David on her face, and bowed herself to the ground,

²⁴And fell at his feet, and said, Upon me, my lord, upon me let this iniquity be: and let thine handmaid, I pray thee, speak in thine audience, and hear the words of thine handmaid.

²⁵Let not my lord, I pray thee, regard this man of Belial, even Nabal: for as his name is, so is he; Nabal is his name, and folly is with him: but I thine handmaid saw not the young men of my lord, whom thou didst send.

²⁶Now therefore, my lord, as the Lord liveth, and as thy soul liveth, seeing the Lord hath withholden thee from coming to shed blood, and from avenging thyself with thine own hand, now let thine enemies, and they that seek evil to my lord, be as Nabal.

²⁷And now this blessing which thine handmaid hath brought unto my lord, let it even be given unto the young men that follow my lord.

²⁸I pray thee, forgive the trespass of thine handmaid: for the Lord will certainly make my lord a sure house; because my lord fighteth the battles of the Lord, and evil hath not been found in thee all thy days.

²⁹Yet a man is risen to pursue thee, and to seek thy soul: but the soul of my lord shall be bound in the bundle of life with the Lord thy God; and the souls of thine enemies, them shall he sling out, as out of the middle of a sling.

³⁰And it shall come to pass, when the Lord shall have done to my lord according to all the good that he hath spoken concerning thee, and shall have appointed thee ruler over Israel;

³¹That this shall be no grief unto thee, nor offence of heart unto my lord, either that thou hast shed blood causeless, or that my lord hath avenged himself: but when the Lord shall have dealt well with my lord, then remember thine handmaid.

³²¶ And David said to Abigail, Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, which sent thee this day to meet me:

³³And blessed be thy advice, and blessed be thou, which hast kept me this day from coming to shed blood, and from avenging myself with mine own hand.

³⁴For in very deed, as the Lord God of Israel liveth, which hath kept me back from hurting thee, except thou hadst hasted and come to meet me, surely there had not been left unto Nabal by the morning light any that pisseth against the wall.

³⁵So David received of her hand that which she had brought him, and said unto her, Go up in peace to thine house; see, I have hearkened to thy voice, and have accepted thy person.

¹³¶ And he lodged there that same night; and took of that which came to his hand a present for Esau his brother;

¹⁴Two hundred she goats, and twenty he goats, two hundred ewes, and twenty rams,

¹⁵Thirty milch camels with their colts, forty kine, and ten bulls, twenty she asses, and ten foals.

¹⁶And he delivered them into the hand of his servants, every drove by themselves; and said unto his servants, Pass over before me, and put a space betwixt drove and drove.

¹⁷And he commanded the foremost, saying, When Esau my brother meeteth thee, and asketh thee, saying, Whose art thou? and whither goest thou? and whose are these before thee?

¹⁸Then thou shalt say, They be thy servant Jacob’s; it is a present sent unto my lord Esau: and, behold, also he is behind us.

¹⁹And so commanded he the second, and the third, and all that followed the droves, saying, On this manner shall ye speak unto Esau, when ye find him.

²⁰And say ye moreover, Behold, thy servant Jacob is behind us. For he said, I will appease him with the present that goeth before me, and afterward I will see his face; peradventure he will accept of me.

²¹So went the present over before him: and himself lodged that night in the company.

²²And he rose up that night, and took his two wives, and his two womenservants, and his eleven sons, and passed over the ford Jabbok.

³⁴And his lord was wroth, and delivered him to the tormentors, till he should pay all that was due unto him.

⁵⁹I tell thee, thou shalt not depart thence, till thou hast paid the very last mite.

⁹Who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power;

¹³For he shall have judgment without mercy, that hath shewed no mercy; and mercy rejoiceth against judgment.

²⁶And beside all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed: so that they which would pass from hence to you cannot; neither can they pass to us, that would come from thence.

⁴¹Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels:

⁴⁶And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal.